4.6 Factors & Influences on Academic Success
Key Takeaways
Attribution retraining helps students credit failure to controllable, unstable causes such as effort and strategy rather than fixed ability.
Self-determination theory holds that motivation grows when schools support autonomy, competence, and relatedness.
The McKinney-Vento Act gives students experiencing homelessness the right to immediate enrollment and to remain in their school of origin with transportation when in their best interest.
Castañeda v. Pickard (1981) set a three-part test for English learner programs: sound theory, adequate resources and implementation, and evaluated effectiveness.
Dual-language (two-way immersion) programs are associated with strong long-term achievement for English learners.
Why These Factors Are Tested
The ETS outline lists factors related to academic progress (school and classroom climate, family involvement, motivation, socioeconomic and environmental factors, language competency, programming for English learners) and asks candidates to understand biological, cultural, developmental, and social influences on academic skills. These factors explain much of the variation in achievement that is not caused by disability. A good evaluation considers them before concluding that a student has a learning disability, and IDEA's exclusionary clause requires it: a learning problem that is primarily the result of environmental, cultural, or economic disadvantage or limited English proficiency is not an SLD (34 CFR § 300.309(a)(3)).
School and Classroom Factors
- Climate and relationships. Students learn more where they feel safe, respected, and connected to at least one caring adult (Section 7.2).
- Teacher expectations. Expectancy effects, first popularized by Rosenthal and Jacobson's "Pygmalion" study (1968), show that teachers' expectations can shape the opportunities, feedback, and challenge they give students. Low expectations for some groups can widen gaps.
- Instructional quality. Explicit instruction, high engagement, and instructional-level material (Sections 4.5 and 1.5).
- Opportunity to learn. Access to a strong curriculum, qualified teachers, and advanced coursework.
Family Involvement
Family involvement is linked to better attendance, behavior, and achievement. The strongest effects come from academic socialization (communicating the value of education, discussing goals and learning strategies) and from supportive home routines, more than from homework help alone. Schools strengthen involvement through two-way communication in the family's language, flexible scheduling, and respect for different forms of involvement (Epstein's framework, Section 8.3).
Motivation
| Theory | Core Idea | School Application |
|---|---|---|
| Self-determination theory (Deci & Ryan) | Motivation, especially intrinsic, grows when three needs are met: autonomy, competence, relatedness | Offer meaningful choices, provide achievable challenges with feedback, build relationships |
| Expectancy-value theory (Eccles) | Effort depends on expecting success and valuing the task (interest, usefulness, importance, cost) | Show relevance; build early success |
| Attribution theory (Weiner) | How students explain success and failure: locus (internal/external), stability, and controllability | Attribution retraining teaches students to credit failure to controllable, unstable causes such as effort and strategy |
| Self-efficacy (Bandura) | Belief in one's capability for a task; built by mastery experiences (strongest), vicarious experience, verbal persuasion, and physiological and emotional states | Arrange small successes; use peer models who succeed |
| Goal orientation | Mastery goals (learning and improving) versus performance goals (looking competent, outperforming others) | Emphasize improvement and learning over ranking |
| Learned helplessness (Seligman) | Repeated uncontrollable failure leads to passivity | Break tasks into steps the student controls; point out effort-outcome links |
| Mindset (Dweck) | Believing ability can grow versus believing it is fixed | Growth-mindset interventions show small average effects in large studies; they work best as part of broader supportive practice |
Extrinsic rewards are neither all good nor all bad. Rewards can build engagement in low-interest tasks and new skills (Section 5.3). Expected, tangible rewards for activities a student already enjoys can reduce later free-choice interest (the overjustification effect), so fade rewards and pair them with praise and meaningful feedback.
Socioeconomic and Environmental Factors
Poverty affects learning through many paths: food insecurity, housing instability, lower access to health care and books, family stress, community violence, and exposure to toxins such as lead. Chronic absence (Section 7.2) and school mobility (frequent school changes) interrupt instruction and relationships.
Students Experiencing Homelessness
The McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act covers children who lack a fixed, regular, and adequate nighttime residence, including those sharing housing due to economic hardship, living in motels, shelters, or cars. Key rights:
- Immediate enrollment, even without records normally required (such as proof of residency or immunization records).
- The right to stay in the school of origin when that is in the student's best interest, with transportation provided.
- A local liaison in every district who identifies students and connects families to services.
- Access to school meals and other programs.
School psychologists should consider housing instability when interpreting attendance, achievement, and behavior data.
Language Competency and Programs for English Learners
Second-language acquisition shapes academic performance for years. Conversational English develops much faster than academic English (Cummins' BICS and CALP, Section 9.1).
Legal Foundations
- Lau v. Nichols (1974): The Supreme Court held that giving non-English-speaking students the same materials and instruction, without language support, denied them a meaningful education under civil rights law.
- Castañeda v. Pickard (1981): The Fifth Circuit set a three-part test for English learner programs: (1) based on a sound educational theory, (2) implemented with adequate resources and personnel, and (3) evaluated and shown to be effective after a reasonable trial.
Program Models
| Model | Description |
|---|---|
| English as a second language (ESL/ELD), pull-out or push-in | Specialized English language development instruction |
| Sheltered instruction (for example, the SIOP model) | Grade-level content taught in English with language supports: visuals, vocabulary preteaching, structured interaction |
| Transitional bilingual education | Early literacy and content in the home language, with a planned move to English-only instruction |
| Developmental (maintenance) bilingual | Continued development of both languages over several years |
| Dual-language / two-way immersion | English learners and English speakers learn together in both languages; long-term studies (for example, Thomas and Collier) associate these programs with strong achievement |
| Newcomer programs | Short-term programs for recent arrivals, including students with interrupted formal education |
Biological, Developmental, Cultural, and Social Influences
- Biological: Genetics (reading disability and ADHD run in families), prenatal exposures (for example, fetal alcohol spectrum disorders), prematurity and low birth weight, chronic illness, hearing loss from recurrent ear infections, lead exposure, sleep, and nutrition.
- Developmental: Cognitive development and readiness (Piaget's stages; Vygotsky's zone of proximal development), maturation of executive functions through adolescence, and relative age within a grade (the youngest children in a class are more often referred).
- Cultural: Home literacy practices, dialect, communication styles, and the match between home and school expectations.
- Social: Peer norms about school, belonging, and stereotype threat (Steele & Aronson, 1995), which is the risk that awareness of a negative stereotype about one's group lowers performance on a challenging task.
Putting It Together in an Evaluation
When a student is not making progress, list the plausible explanations before testing for a disability:
- Instructional history and match
- Attendance and mobility
- Language background and English proficiency
- Health, vision, and hearing
- Motivation and engagement
- Family and community circumstances
Each can be addressed directly, and ruling them in or out is required before identifying an SLD.
After failing two quizzes, a seventh grader says, "I'm just bad at math. There's no point trying." Which intervention most directly addresses this belief?
Attribution retraining that helps the student link outcomes to controllable, changeable causes such as effort and strategy use.
Moving the student to a lower math class so the work feels easier.
Giving the student a tangible reward for each quiz taken, regardless of performance.
Telling the student that math ability is fixed but that he has other talents.
A family living in a motel after an eviction tries to enroll their child, but they do not have a lease or the child's immunization records. Under the McKinney-Vento Act, what should the school do?
Enroll the child immediately, contact the district's homeless liaison, and help obtain the missing records.
Deny enrollment until the family provides proof of residency and immunization records.
Enroll the child only if the family agrees to a special education evaluation.
Refer the family to the school the child attended before the eviction, which is solely responsible for the child.
A district's English learner program is challenged in a complaint. Under the three-part test from Castañeda v. Pickard (1981), which question is NOT one of the three parts?
Is the program based on a sound educational theory?
Is the program implemented with adequate resources and personnel?
After a reasonable trial, is the program shown to be effective in overcoming language barriers?
Does the program guarantee that all English learners exit within one year?
Sections you finish are checked off in the contents.